The adventures of a homeschooling family

Howard and RachelAnnie, Emma, Sarah, Laura and Adam

Monday, November 14, 2011

Same old same old

Aside from reviewing , what have we been up to? Nothing out of the ordinary.
We are adjusting to living in a small house in a small town. We can't go to the grocery store in the middle of the night, so we are learning to plan our shopping. We have a much larger ward geographically, and a stake center that is a drive, instead of it being in our ward boundaries. We are also trying to figure out what to do with our extra stuff. We have boxes of stuff in our garage that we needed before, but don't now. We have toy bins, toy food, Potato heads, toys that we haven't unpacked. We have boxes and boxes of books, but less book storage.

We are homeschooling in our dining room. While it is nice to have it in a main living area, it presents a challenge because everything is in the main living area! With 3 kids schooling and 2 preschoolers, some days it is a wreck! When we began homeschooling again 4 years ago, Howard was adamant that we not have one of "those" homeschool homes, where it is always messy with experiments, schoolwork, maps on the wall, etc. Well, we have 2 large maps, calendar, chalkboards, etc visible when you walk in the door. We only have one experiment going now, a chicken bone in vinegar. And yes, there is schoolwork all over.

Our sliding doors have become a giant writing board

It has been an adjustment. We have changed our focus from having a pristine house to having a learning house. Sometimes the lessons are painful. Today the kids are trying to climb the door jambs. I am calling it PE.

Keeping Adam and Laura out of the way during school hours has been challenging. We have decided on having them in their seats for their table time, so they aren't wandering all over the house. Its a work in progress.

Laura and Adam scooting like worms down the hallway

Adam using bingo markers

Not all of it ended up on the paper

Adam exploring letter magnets for the first time

Sarah earnestly writing letters in a workbook

Annie and Emma are getting more interested in robotics, how things work, etc. They are currently building a hydraulic arm for a review.

If you look all around, you can see our current chaos

Emma has been doing experiments with her muscles. She tried to keep her arms extended for 5 full minutes, then did the pushing in a doorway for 1 minute thing. She also get to work her muscles as she practices basketball for her local team.

Howard painted the nasty purple/plum trim on the front of the house, because he couldn't take it anymore. All the neighbors have stopped by to say thank you, it was that bad.